Geeks usually have, in their DIY bags, many usb-to-serial converters such as Arduino’s or Openpicus’. These converters, for the people not accustomed to microcontrollers’ world, are circuits normally used for uploading compiled code from the PC. Additionally, they are used to serially communicate with the PC. They take usb signal and convert it to serial TTL.
Even though serial TTL is very important when communicating with microcontrollers, many home and industrial devices exchange data using RS485 protocol. The main benefits of using RS485 are basically efficiency, economy, the long distances allowed between devices (up to 1200 meters) in electrically noisy environments. Continue reading